Bontok, Rapeless (2014)

• 87%
• 2014
• Documentary
• Mark Lester Valle

Two Filipinas, both victims of sexual abuse in varying degrees, yearn and search for a utopia where women can live without being sexually violated. By chance, they encounter a study by renowned anthropologist June Prill-Brett, Ph.D., which states that the Bontok of the Philippine Cordilleras has lived for eras without a term, nor concept, nor incidence, of rape. At last, a utopia, where the most heinous of gender crimes is unheard of. Or, is it?The search centers on the municipality of Bontoc, the locus of Bontok culture. Alas, the move to completely revalidate Dr. Bretts statement is a generation too late. Oral tradition is now seldom retold, and the last generation of Bontok Igorots who have lived in the traditional ato and olog are already in their twilight years.Through judiciary archives, local government records, and the oral narratives of Bontok elders, the mission does find its holy grail, albeit almost dead: suffocating under the inevitable weight of alien culture and mass media. If at all, the rape-less society still exists, but only within very small, tightly-knit Bontok communes. Still exists, but trapped in the rapidly-fading past: the last evidence proving its very existence is the collective memory of Bontok elders who do not even know each other, all saying Idi, awan! Tatta, addan (In our days, there was none! But today, there is rape)In this world where the universality of women oppression is widely believed, how did a rape-less society ever become possible?